i love my father, and i love him well...

alexi murdoch, "someday soon."


happy father's day, daddio!

things i like, the recap...

i haven't done one of these in a while! things i have liked as of late: knitting ridiculous garments of clothing with leftover yarn.


whales named mr. splashy pants!


collecting wrist bands.


grand monuments you can climb to the top of.


finishing sweaters.


camping with my nephew who doesn't, in fact, hate me (he was in need of a nap here... really).


washington state. i want to hike the pacific crest trail now.


reflections on clear, clear water.


did i mention i think my nephew is the cutest thing on two legs?


also... the tulip train trestle.




also also, i don't have pictures of these things, but: seeing four moons of jupiter using binoculars. hanging out with neighbors on stoops, talking about movies. watching the international space station zoom past overhead. watching planet earth on impromptu sleeping bags on the living room floor. breakfast burritos. and cuddling.

things i like this weekend...

new baby toes!


dresses with pockets.


this song - sleigh bells, "tell 'em."


and planning my first knit bomb... barber shop poles for all!

christmas and post-christmas knitting!

i've been so busy knitting, i haven't had time to update! so here goes - this post will likely be photo-heavy and text-light. probably. maybe. well, we'll see.

first, my nephew, ben, loved his knitted baby blocks. and he can grab them! and put them in his mouth! he got his first tooth on christmas day, so i'm guessing he'll continue wanting to put everything and anything in his drooly little mug. this was over thanksgiving - ben's FIRST first christmas celebration!


here they are, minus the adorable, drooly little guy.


here's me singing ben the charlie brown christmas song.


true to form, when faced with all sorts of craft-related deadlines (finish a sweater, make 40+ christmas cards, finish dad's golf club covers, etc.), i decided to start a million other projects. like these legwarmers. i pretty much just did a cabled pattern, knit flat (because all my circulars were taken up with other projects), increased evenly up the calf. also? my cat is a camera whore.


this was another side project, made while i should have been finishing other projects. and i wonder why i felt so rushed the week before leaving for christmas? i started knitting this in seattle over thanksgiving - with a small baby, we ended up having a decent amount of downtime around my brother and sis-in-law's house, which is just fine by me. that's how i like my vacations - knitting, movies, some mellow sightseeing, maybe a candy apple and hot donuts from pike place market thrown in for good measure. i used the pattern from the leaf t-shirt, and then just kind of made up the rest on my own. i love the fit. this is one of my favorite finished objects to date.


and one more ridiculous/awesome project - i decided this orange and hot pink leftover yarn i had were screaming to become hot pants. again, i was procrastinating finishing all of my other projects. i finished these this morning, and i am seriously, seriously in love with them. i predict a hot pants dance-off in the streets of bloomington. i also plan to wear these under a dress soon just so i can flash people all day long. i made these using seasha's studio shorts pattern - it took a little work to eliminate wrap and turn-related holes, but in the end, it worked like a charm.


on christmas morning, i was also thrilled to learn my mom's christmas sweater fits her like a glove! i think she likes it. i used the cabled pattern and sizing from rosamund's cardigan, but i centered the front cabled panels and, obviously, made it long-sleeved.


i was shooting for this sweater from j. jill, which my mom saw and loved back in september or so. i think it looks somewhat, kind of, sort of similar. right?


and to round this whole picture-laden post out, here's a sampling of photos from the last month. merry christmas, happy holidays, happy new year! here's ben and i over thanksgiving playing the "eat the baby" game, which he loved.


me and mom on the underground seattle tour.


the proper way to handle a baby. this picture slays me.


mt. rainier caused a traffic jam on the bridge back to redmond.


me pretending to be a ballerina in the nutcracker ballet. ah, christmas...


christmas time for real! the girl cousins at our family christmas party:


the museum of contemporary art in chicago. i need more plexiglas ceilings in my life, i think.


more plexiglas love.


trent con plexiglas and steel.


mom and dad at the macy's tree in chicago. aren't they adorable?


ah, christmas morning. one of my consistently favorite days of the year. maybe my only.


one of my christmas gifts - a page in the best book ever of all time. ever.


normally, i would be at work on a monday morning. instead? this was me at, oh, 11:00 this morning. i woke up, did yoga (rodney yee kicks all butt), drank coffee, and finished knitting a pair of hot pants. lovely. i love vacation.

the prolific knitter...

things for which i am currently thankful: bagels (one side with cream cheese, one side with peanut butter - crunchy, of course); open windows in november; football; coffee; laundry machines; my cat, boombox; super-ridiculous-fun weekends with friends; and perrier citron.

i have been crazy prolific with the knitting lately. like, it's a little frightening. i think really what it is is that i'm working on two sweaters right now. due to the sweater knitting, i have had the intense need to be able to start and finish a project in one night. add to that the fact that i have nearly countless single skeins or half-skeins of yarn, and the result is that i have a whole slew of hats and neck warmers marching off the needles lately. marching two by two.

first, though, i did manage to finish the farmer's market cardigan for my sister-in-law. christmas will come early this year since we will be flying out to seattle for thanksgiving, and the bro, sil, and newphew will be headed to maine for christmas proper. so yeah... had to get the thing done! it is so ridiculously cozy, and now i want one of my own. excuse the crappy photo - my house has no good lighting in it.


on to the small things. i've started getting pretty good at making neck warmers and hats from my own head. this one didn't even make it to my etsy shop - i'm selling it to my friend, susanne, instead! i used a stitch pattern from my grandma's ancient knitting book, then did a split bottom and a split, foldover top. i kinda love it.


the main stitch pattern - sort of a fake cable waffle thing going on. mmm, waffles.


i also did up a slightly bulky, slightly lacy simple tube neck warmer. available at famousthecat.etsy.com!


and last, but certainly not least, my friend, ian, has been clamoring for a handknit hat for ages. AGES. geez, will he just shut up already? in order to shut him up, i went for it. again, this is knit up with yarn from my ridiculous stash. the unfolded, slouchier version of ian's windy city hat:


the folded version. i thought i'd like the slouchier version better, but i think this is my fave way of wearing it. plus, the foldover brim gives those little ears some extra wooly coverage when the wind is whipping off the lake.


happy weekend!

warm wallaby...

hooey! it's been a while! i have been knitting my little hands off, working on a variety of top secret christmas knits, and as a result, i haven't been posting much. no more! done! fin! nein! niet! no mas!

first, let me tell you why i had to bust through the current sweater on the needles. it was a project just for me - rosamund's cardigan in knitpicks bulky wallaby. wallaby! who doesn't love a color named wallaby? really, it's kind of a dusty brownish gray. but whatevs. wallaby! so that was on the needles, but then my mom and i went shopping. she fell in love with the following sweater at j. jill. and i was like, "dude! i could knit that!" so i went ahead and ordered yarn - and, for once, the yarn came way too fast. i had to get my own cardigan off the needles before i could start the one for my mama. so yeah... i tore through this sucker like no other.

here's the inspiration for my mom's sweater. basically, i'm doing a second rosamund's cardigan, only long-sleeved and with the front centered rather than off to the side. the color of the yarn is a bit lighter than i was hoping for - but it was the closest i could come. really, as long as it fits and she likes it, i'll be happy.


and drumroll please... here is my new favorite finished object.


i love this shot - i thought the self-timer was on, but no.


oh! and i made a ridiculous oscar the grouch sweater. the yarn reminds me of toxic waste. this came from my head - just an easy, seamless top down raglan. i wanted it to be cropped. the yarn made me think of those little fuzzy mohair sweaters chicks wore in the 50's. only, you know, toxic waste-y.


i'm working on the farmer's market sweater for my sister-in-law, but i've kind of hit a wall. i'll get back to it once i'm done with mom's sweater... or once i hit the sleeves. sleeves are such a pain in the butt. i asked my bro and sis-in-law what the nephew might need - a hat and mittens. okee-dokey, says i! again, these are more or less from my own head. i love the way the malabrigo pooled in the hat into that weird psychedelic swirlie.

look! ear flaps!


and mitts - gotta connect 'em somehow.


finally? proof positive that my nephew is the cutest, most ridiculous, most talkative 3-1/2 month old in the universe.

oh, hello, old friend...

things have been a little surreal lately. a little bizarre. a little nice. i realized i haven't updated this thing in almost a month, and i honestly thought, "well, what the heck have i been DOING?!" mostly, i've been working and having fun. so there's that.

i went to seattle for a brief stay last weekend to meet the munchkin, aka the nubbin, jammin, benjamin, ben, the nephew. it made me so sad when i left to think that the next time i see him at thanksgiving, he will be five months old. so much time to miss in baby time.

there are far too many "favorite" pictures to post from the trip, so we'll only do a few. i was there for a total of two days - the second day, we drove up to deception pass state park in washington and made our way down whidbey island to the ferry back. this was after a very satisfying hunt for rocks at north beach.


the prettiest seaweed in all the land.


ben is a noisy, vigorous little guy. he does everything vigorously. he even SLEEPS vigorously, with his grunts and coos and hoots. he's not fussy at all. he's just vigorous. however, get him in his wrappy thing in a noisy place (like, say, pike place market), and he's passed right the heck out.


me and dad in his humboldt state sweatshirt. i don't even own an article of clothing from humboldt, and i WENT there, for goodness' sakes!


i really love this photo. ben's first ferry ride! he loved the light, the noise... and he loves hanging his head upside down when he looks at the world.


oh, and in addition to pike place market on friday, we also went to the most hilarious brewery tour i have ever been on. redhook brewery tour - if you are ever in that area, you must go. me, my bruddah, and my mama.


our flight out of seattle circled around mt. st. helens. goodbye for now, pacific northwest. i will always love you.


i got home and finally finished up a few projects that had been blocking for lord knows how long. first, i made myself a sweater. i'm really proud of this sucker ( ihaven't counted the bobbles yet... the bobbles sucked).


although my initial desire was to make this sweater in some bright, crazy color (as i have been known to do on occasion), i also desperately needed a warm, black, awesome cardigan. so yeah... i went with it.


then the christmas knitting begins. this'll be for my mom, made using the springtime bandit pattern and good ol' noro kureyon yarn. i really want to keep it for myself, but i guess i'll settle for just making another one.